Page 5 of The Mountain Man's Mail Order Temptation
“Come on,” I hear myself say, and step back to let her inside. Except I don’t move far enough back, and as she enters, pulling her glittery pink suitcase behind her, her arm brushes against my chest.
My breath catches in my lungs for some unknown reason, and it’s a full second before I breathe again. I don’t know what the fuck that was, but it was damned uncomfortable. I close the door behind her and lock it.
She’s looking around my cabin, and I wonder what she thinks. The place was one strong breeze away from falling in on itself when I came. Ezra had new windows put in to keep the family of raccoons out, but other than that, nothing had been done in the five years since the previous owner, old man Stills, had moved into the local nursing home. Every refinished floorboard and resurfaced cabinet were done by me, with help from Ezra. Some of the local ex-military guys living on this mountain helped with the roof and the porches until this cabin became a home. My home.
“Wow, Anson, it’s amazing. It looks like something out of a catalog.”
Warmth fills my chest at the compliment. “It’s not much.”
“You do have a certain minimalist style. Not a knickknack in sight.”She grins at me, and the dimples in her cheeks make my damn heart flip-flop.
I have the sudden urge to trace my thumb over those little indents. To pull her closer and fill all my senses with the sweet, sugary scent of her skin before I kiss her.
Jesus Christ, Blackwood. Get it together, for fuck’s sake. You’ve seen beautiful women before.
Except I can’t remember the last time I was this near to one. When was the last time I had sex? I haven’t even thought about it in months. Maybe longer. A lot longer. My cock is responding to her, filling until it shows beneath my sweats.
This is a disaster, and there’s only one person to blame. “Make yourself at home. I need to make a call.”
Ellie crosses her arms over her chest, which pushes her breasts together and plumps them up against the neckline of her dress.
I drag my gaze off those creamy white mounds up to meet her eyes. She’s biting her lower lip, looking nervous.
“You don’t know who I am, do you?”
No sense in lying. “Sorry. I wish I did.” I hadn’t meant to say the second part, and I’m surprised to realize that it’s true.
“What about the messages? You didn’t send them? You didn’t pay for my plane ticket? First class?”
Goddammit Dottie. Ellie looks like she’s on the verge of tears because I’m not who she thinks I am. “No.” I step closer. To do what, I have no idea. Comforting women isn’t something I know how to do. Even with my grandmother and sister. “I think this is my grandmother’s doing. Dottie is?—”
“Dottie? Does she work for Perfect Pairings?”
“SheisPerfect Pairings. It’s something she and her matchmaking friends dreamed up for lonely idiots…” Her brows scrunch together. “Uh, lonely mountain men. Like me, apparently. Let me call her. We’ll work this out.”
Ellie nods, looking like a dejected doll.
I clench my fist to keep from reaching for her. To… put my arms around her? Tell her it’s okay? I’m not that kind of man. I’m the opposite. The last person a soft, pretty woman like Ellie should get close to.
I grab my phone off the counter and step out onto the porch. The night air is cool and calm, with the slight rustle of pines and the chirping of insects. Stars are beginning to appear above as the sun slowly sets. I pace across the porch, dialing Dottie. It goes straight to voicemail.
I hang up and press the call button a second time. Voicemail again. My teeth clench when I hear her recording. She always answers her phone. That she isn’t now is more than suspect. “Dottie, you better have forgotten to plug in your phone and are not screening my calls.” I hang up and redial. “You put a sweet girl full of hopes and dreams on a plane and now she’s onmy porch. If this is your idea of a joke, I’m revoking your Wi-Fi. Call me.”
I disconnect the call and shove the phone in my back pocket. Goddammit, she’s meddling in people’s lives. Ellie can’t be more than twenty-one years old, and she packed up her sparkly suitcase to marry a total stranger because my grandmother thought she’d be a good match? Aside from the fact that she’s at least a decade younger than me, who matches the picture of innocence with a man who bleeds darkness? No one deserves to be ambushed like this.
Biting back a growl, I yank open the door and step back into the cabin, trying to figure out how to resolve this. And stop cold.
Ellie is standing in front of the fire warming her fingers. She turns at the sound of my boots and quickly swipes a tear from her face.
I move closer, clocking the moisture rimming her eyes and the rise and fall of her chest. The sniffles and the way she clenches her hands. She’s upset, but the longer I look, the more I see. A fine tremor runs through her body; her shoulders are stiff, and there’s a hell of a lot more than uncertainty in those blue eyes. There’s worry, and beneath that, fear.
I freeze, not wanting to scare her more. She’s in a stranger’s house. My house. Hell, even the men I call friends have hesitated at times when around me. Like they can sense I no longer have a soul. Even though I don’t want Ellie here, I sure as hell don’t want to scare her away either.
Ellie takes a hesitant step toward me, then another. The scent of vanilla surrounds us. “Did you reach her?”
My breath catches. She’s looking at me with a mixture of hope and dread, and that’s when I realize… Ellie isn’t scared of me. She’s afraid of going back to wherever she came from. Petrified of it.
All the questions I’d pushed aside because I’m pissed at Dottie come rushing back. What makes a beauty like Ellie sign up to be a mail-order bride to a total stranger on a remote mountain? She doesn’t seem the type to crave solitude.
